What has become of the people who were assigned to perform our "enhanced interrogations'?
Can we really expect people to torture another human being for weeks - months - shoot food up their rectums, march them around naked with a hood, tie them up in "uncomfortable" positions, water board them, allow one to die of hyperthermia - and then go home and tuck the kids in and live a normal life? Do we really think that hardening someone enough to do these sorts of things has no effect on THEM? And shouldn't we question the psychological stability of people who approved this?
What has happened to our American psyche? Who have we become? Do we want to be known as being just as barbaric as those who attack us? Are we as blood thirsty as our enemies?
We know that mass murderers first learned to harden themselves to any empathy with their victims. Often they learned to torture helpless animals before escalating to torturing and killing humans. Now we tasked our own CIA people to torture humans. How is that going to turn out? Would you like to be alone with one of these agents? Would you like your son or daughter to marry one of them? Who wouldn't they be willing to torture if someone told them it was "necessary" or if they just decided on their own that it was "necessary"?
In war after war we see our soldiers return with terrible post traumatic stress. Their lives and the lives of those who love them are forever changed. And we keep sending them off expecting them to return and resume a normal life unaffected.
What has happened to our American psyche? Who have we become? War has become a normal state of affairs. And now we justify torture?
The same people who justify war and torture want us to be known as a "Christian" nation. Whoa! There is something very wrong here!!! We have a whole bunch of things backassward. Where is our basic intelligence? Where are our basic morals?
If we become hardened to war, hardened to torture as our cultural norm, we are doomed as a society. It won't matter what name we give it. America is turning about as anti-Christ as can be imagined.
I remember well the feelings on the day and post 911. I am a veteran and served at the Survival School Headquarters where we trained people to survive being a POW. I heard many first hand stories of those held in captivity and treated brutally. This is not something I want sanctioned as an American way of doing things. It's not the country I proudly served.
It's deeply disturbing that many Anti-Christ activities are being promoted under a Christian banner. Millions of Americans are falling for it. Could you - would you - perpetrate torture on another human being? If you find yourself saying yes, please seek help. Our world needs you to be well. We won't get well until we have a world of people who understand why this is not the right thing to do.
We cannot kill one another off to get to that place of healing. We cannot torture one another to get to that place of healing. We have to heal one another. That is what Jesus taught.
If it is not about healing - if it is not about compassion - if it is not based in love - it is Anti-Christ.
Which side are you?
I got into a very heated argument with a close friend when this issue first arose during Bush's presidency. As a Fox loving conservative, she was fully convinced that we were justified in torturing because it would save American lives. The Bush administration (Cheney) was able to sufficiently scare the Fox News audience at the time into thinking that we were in a new era of danger which required new tactics. I argued that studies showed torture does not work (even John McCain argued that) . And even if it did, if the US sank to that level, we would lose our humanity. And then what would we have gained? I was told if we were attacked again by terrorists I would deserve that because of my bleeding heart liberal thinking. I've never recovered from the pain of that discussion. I saw her in a whole new light.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with you, but there are so many ordinary people who have bought into this thinking. It is so disheartening. Thank you for writing about it.
Isn't that what we prosecuted & chastised the Nazis & North Vietnamese for: hideous war/after war tortures? Are we above our own standards? It's ok for us but not done unto us? Is it really worth it? All I can say is if they do it to your loved one, you can't call FOUL! Losing faith in America one Politician at a time.
ReplyDeleteWe know that ordinary people were persuaded to support or overlook terrible acts in Nazi Germany. A very effective propaganda machine made that possible. In the 50's the McCarthy propaganda machine very effectively destroyed people's lives until people like Edwin R. Murrow said "enough". Now we have Fox news. It's shocking to see how people we know can be so twisted up with the rhetoric they spew. It's sad Pam, that a friend could say something like that and not see it as wrong. We have to keep talking. We have to regain faith in America one person at a time. Politically, the next few years are going to be tough.
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